


The Curse of a Christian Woman

by TiyeTiye



Series: Things That Go Bump In The Night [2]
Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Asmodeus - Freeform, Black Dog, Black Wolf - Freeform, Curses, Death curse, Human Sacrifice, Monsters, black magic, blood sacrifice, curse, things that go bump in the night - Freeform, witch curse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-23 21:56:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12517424
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TiyeTiye/pseuds/TiyeTiye
Summary: After they lead the attack on King Ecbert's villa, Bjorn Ironside and his brothers come to realize that Judith, Aethelwulf's beautiful wife, is not nearly as defenseless as she seems.





	The Curse of a Christian Woman

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Graphic depictions of violence, death, murder, and suicide, blood and gore, swearing, abuse and violence towards animals (dogs), violent attacks by a monster, deaths by fire
> 
> My other idea for @synnersaint’s “Things That Go Bump In The Night” Halloween Heathen Prompt, based off of a slightly altered Season 4B. In this timeline, after Alfred’s birth and Aethelstan’s departure from Wessex, Judith and Aethelwulf actually reconcile and are happy together, and while Judith has a good relationship with Ecbert, she never becomes his mistress. Hope you all enjoy!

These English warriors actually put up a fight. 

You had to give them that. 

The Great Army had fought them for hours that day, ebbing and flowing across the battlefield in a red-coated tide, until they finally succeeded in driving them from the battlefield just as the sun began to go down. Ecstatic at their victory, Ivar, Hvitserk, and Sigurd had wanted to press on after them immediately, chase them back to their bolt-holes and flush them out like frightened rabbits - it took the combined convincing of Bjorn, Ubbe, Floki, the descending red sun, and the steadily darkening sky to convince them to wait until morning. The men were tired, and the day’s battle had left them with many wounded to look after and many dead brothers-in-arms to bury - the English could wait until morning. 

It wasn’t far to Ecbert’s villa. 

And their enemy had nowhere left to run. 

That night the Great Army made camp among a forest of massive spreading oak trees by the light of a blood moon and the howling of wolves sang them to sleep.

————————————————————————————————————————————

The next morning dawned gray and cool, the sun hiding her face behind a swath of cloud. The Great Army tore out of the mist like the wolves of the forest, howling and baying for more plunder, more treasure, more English blood. They fell upon the walls of Ecbert’s villa and tore its defenders apart. Bjorn was the first through the smashed-open gates, closely followed by his younger brothers, the sons of Ragnar come to destroy those who thought they could kill their father and go unpunished. 

Yet as hungry as the Great Army was, as hot as the fires of their hatred might be, the English stood fast and defended their home and their king to the last man. They did not break. They did not run. They did not abandon their oaths and their duty. For every English warrior killed by the Army, a Viking warrior was also sent to Valhalla. Back and forth the battle raged, and churning red sea of men clashing together and falling back apart, battle lines collapsing and re-forming. But the fury of the Northmen would not be denied. Inch by inch the Great Army drove the English back, off of the walls, through the inner yard, to the steps of the villa, and then inside, tripping over still-twitching bodies of both friend and foe as they went. In the chaos, Bjorn still managed to glimpse his younger brothers from time to time. Ubbe was back to back with Hvitserk, battling a group of five English warriors near the church. Ivar appeared out of nowhere, leaning out to hack at the English with his axe while his horse reared and kicked at those foolish enough to get near him. He saw Sigurd with a group of their warriors, battling the English guarding the doors to Ecbert’s hall. 

The sun climbed higher and higher, burning away the morning mist, and soon there were no more English left to fight. Looking for his brothers, Bjorn turned into the yard in front of the blacksmith’s to find Ubbe and Hvitserk, both covered in blood yet apparently uninjured, and smiled when he saw them.

“You’ve made it then. That is good. And what of Ivar? Sigurd?”

“Ivar I saw — oh, right over there,” Ubbe said, grinning when the pale shape of Ivar’s horse appeared around the corner, pulling their youngest brother behind him.

Bjorn returned Ivar’s wave before he turned back to Ubbe. 

“And Sigurd?”

Ubbe’s good cheer faltered. “I…I don’t know. I have not seen him since we took the gate.” He turned to Hvitserk, who shrugged and shook his head.

“I have not seen him either.”

An icy feeling was starting to crawl up Bjorn’s spine. By now, Ivar had joined them in the middle of the yard. 

“Where is Sigurd? Have you seen him?”

Ivar soothed his horse as the animal shied away from Bjorn. “I have not seen him. Why should I know where he is?” 

Bjorn scowled up at him - now was not the time for their rivalry. He hefted his shield back up, gripped his sword a bit tighter, and stalked away across the yard towards Ecbert’s villa. He made it a few steps before turning back to see that none of his brothers had moved. 

“Well? Come on then. Let’s go find him.” 

———————————————————————————————————————————

The interior of Ecbert’s villa looked like a thunderstorm had clawed through it. What the English had not snatched up in their hurry to flee the Great Army had been knocked over, smashed, or torn apart by their men in search of plunder. Bjorn and his brothers looked through the kitchens, the cellars, the chapel, the baths, and the great hall, and still there was no sign of Sigurd. Finally, Hvitserk turned down a narrow corridor to find a door that looked like it had been hacked open, only to be hastily wedged shut again using a large piece of furniture. Calling for his brothers, he Bjorn, and Ubbe eventually succeeded in forcing the door open while Ivar watched their backs. 

Bursting into the room, at first glance the chamber appeared to be empty. Nothing but row after row of wooden shelves filled with the English king’s books, and dozens and dozens of those strange rolls of paper. 

Then they heard the sound. 

Someone was humming a lullaby. Softly. Sweetly. Underneath it all was a pained, continuous whimper. 

Ubbe caught sight of the booted foot sticking out from behind a knocked over table, and then there he was - they had found Sigurd.

He was lying on his back, hands pressed against his belly, trying and failing to stop the flow of blood that seeped between his fingers and turned the front of his tunic black. His skin was pale and ashen, his eyes glassy from the pain, but he still recognized them, and weakly raised a hand out to them for help. 

“Ba- Bjorn…huh- huh- help me.”

Next to him was the dead body of a dark-haired man with a beard, still gripping his sword and wearing armor much finer than that of any of the other English warriors they had faced. Aethelwulf, King Ecbert’s son. Seated behind Sigurd was a dark-haired woman, about Bjorn’s age. He thought he remembered her - she had to be Judith, Aethelwulf’s wife. She was holding Sigurd’s head in her lap and stroking his hair. 

“Oh good,” she said, ceasing her humming, looking up at them and smiling sweetly. “You’ve found us. I was so worried you weren’t going to make it in time.” She cocked her head at the scraping sound of Ivar’s approach and caught his eye as he peered around the overturned table. “And you’ve brought the cripple with you too. Excellent. All of the sons of Ragnar in one room.” 

Bjorn started towards her, but before could do anything a silver dagger appeared in Judith’s hand, pressed against Sigurd’s throat.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” she said, the voice of a mother speaking to a misbehaving child. “Your brother…killed my husband.” She reached over with her free hand to tenderly brush the hair off of the dead man’s forehead. “We thought we could escape… make it out before your people caught us… but we weren’t fast enough. Your brother caught us… and he killed my husband.” She dipped her fingers into the mingled blood of Sigurd and Aethelwulf and turned back to them with a small smile. “But he wasn’t fast enough either, was he?” 

“Kuh- Kuh- _Kill her._ ” Sigurd growled out through clenched teeth, but Judith just shushed him and went back to petting his hair with her bloody hand, dagger still pressed to his throat.

“Oh hush now darling, we’re nearly done. And you’ve been doing so well.” She looked back up, but she was no longer seeing them - instead her eyes took in the shelves and their dozens and dozens of books and scrolls and manuscripts. 

“I found it in here, a little while after they taught me to read,” she said in a wavering voice. “My father in law wasn’t supposed to have it, it might have even cost him his crown and his life if the Bishop had found out about it, such heresy… but Ecbert always was a naughty thing. He never cared too much for rules. So I decided that I wouldn’t either. I took it and I read it where no one could see, and that book taught me about many things. So many useful things…” 

She raised her bloody hand to her lips, licking off the blood and giving a violent shudder. Gone now was the face of the patient mother, the dutiful wife, the gracious princess. A snarling fiend of made of rage and grief and hatred had taken her place. 

“Asmodeus, Prince of Hell!” she cried. “I gift to you the blood of three kings! And my soul is yours if you will fulfill my curse!” Sneering at Bjorn and his brothers, she carried on. “May you never again know rest! May you never again know peace! May you never again know hope and love and kindness! May you be driven and hunted across the world like the beasts that you are, until you die, alone and friendless and terrified, with no one to remember your names! May your souls burn for all eternity while the wolves devour your corpses!” 

Before they could stop her, Judith slashed the dagger across Sigurd’s throat, then reversed her grip and plunged the dagger into her own chest. Sigurd died quietly, barely strong enough to raise a hand to this new wound, eyes fluttering before going still. Judith gave a pained little gasp as the steel parted her skin, but as the red flower bloomed and grew in the pale linen of her gown, she did something none of them thought possible. 

She laughed.

Laughed at the sight of her lifeblood running down her chest, a bright and high and clear sound, like a joyful child delighted to have gotten exactly what she wanted. 

Laughed as the ruby drops touched the stone only to shrink and disappear, seeping away as _something_ drank them in. 

Now her laugh was changing, her mad cackling joined by a deeper, darker voice from an unseen throat. It echoed through the room in time with her own, chewing through their bodies and gnawing at their ears, growing louder and louder until they could feel it ringing in their bones as she knelt before them.

Only, what knelt before them wasn’t Judith any more. Dark, inky lines had begun to radiate out from her wound, tracing along the courses of her veins, and behind them her skin was turning a dark ash gray, peeling and cracking as her flesh lost its ivory luster. Her mouth was still open in her mad, joyous laughter, bright white teeth bared upward, when the dark lines crawled up her neck to her face. As they did, her laugh morphed into a scream, the second voice joining her in a deep, bestial roar. The icy blue of her eyes went black, spreading out from her pupils until she stared back at them through twin orbs of night. She shuddered with a strange, violent ecstasy as one of the lines touched her lips, her mouth falling open wider, and wider, and wider still, hinging open like Jormungandr ready to devour them.

The brothers recoiled in horror at the sight of her, kneeling there and snarling at them with her black eyes and her too many teeth. Bjorn gave a war cry and raised his sword to take her head off, but before he could strike she _shattered_. With the sound of a thunderclap, her body _burst_ , the pieces scattering, darting and scuttling and swirling around the room like thousands of insects. They burned and stung at their exposed faces and necks - the brothers could only hide behind their shields as the storm raged around them, until suddenly it was over. 

Cautiously peering over the rims of their shields, they were dumbfounded to see that the hall was now completely empty. Aethelwulf’s body was gone. Sigurd’s body was gone. Judith’s blood was completely gone from the smooth stone floor, but the spot where she had been kneeling was blackened and cracked, as though it had been struck by lighting. 

“What was that?!” Hvitserk asked between frightened gulps of air, looking around at his surviving brothers with terrified eyes. “What in the gods’ name did she **_do?!_** ”

“I don’t know…” Bjorn answered, looking as though he were struggling to stay standing. “I don’t know.”

———————————————————————————————————————————

Not one of the brothers got any sleep for the next three days. Not because of a deep, all consuming grief at their brothers death, although Sigurd was mourned by his brothers and his people. Not out of some lingering fear or nightmares thanks to the Christian woman’s magic and her curse. Instead, every night, the brothers were kept awake by howling. Once the sun would slip below the horizon, every hunting dog in the kennels, mongrel in the village, and wolf in the woods would begin to bay and howl at the moon, and they _would not stop_ until the sun rose. By the second day the brothers had grown snappish and short with each other. By the third day, they were miserable. Bjorn took to staying in his tent by himself, doing his best to go over battle plans. Hvitserk began killing any dog that crossed his path. Ivar’s temper grew so frayed that even Ubbe couldn’t deal with him anymore. 

The other members of the Great Army weren’t spared the nightly chorus either. Talk was beginning to spread of the gods deserting them, of a curse brought on by the Christian’s god, of taking the army elsewhere, or of even sailing home. 

With all of this, the funeral for Sigurd a few days later was a short and subdued affair. There was no body, so it seemed almost pointless to build a stone ship for him, but Bjorn and Ubbe had insisted, and so had Floki, once they had been able to tell him what had happened to their brother. He was a son of Ragnar, so he must have a monument, thus a great pit was dug and filled with grave goods to sustain Sigurd Snake-In-The-Eye during his next life. His brothers had found his axes and his battered shield in the wreckage of the library, so those were placed inside, and a thrall was sacrificed to seek for him in Valhalla. Given how he had died, consumed by some strange, Christian magic, it was the best they could do. They lined the edges of his empty grave with stones and did their best to feast to his memory back at the camp. 

————————————————————————————————————————————

They only made it a few hours before the sun slipped past the horizon and the howling started again. Ubbe groaned, clapping his hands over his ears and resting his head on the table in front of him dejectedly. Bjorn said nothing, just sat and drained his jug of ale, hoping that if he had enough he’d be too drunk to care anymore and would finally be able to sleep. Ivar hurled his cup away from him with a cry of frustration, straight at a cowering thrall, while Hvitserk stood up and drew his sword. 

“That’s it,” he said, desperation and exhaustion grating through his voice as he headed out. “If they won’t stop I am going to kill _every_ _single fucking dog_ I can find until—”

He never made it out of the tent. Without warning the howling suddenly stopped, and the silence it left behind was far worse. The brothers and their men had three, maybe four breaths of complete and utter silence broken only by the pounding of their own hearts before the sound of a thunderclap burst overhead, loud enough to split the night.

Then the screaming started. It was coming from outside their tent, from the direction of Ecbert’s ransacked villa, and it was getting closer. The brothers looked at each other, grabbed their weapons, and darted outside.

What they saw would haunt them all for the rest of their lives. Outlined by the flickering torchlight and the army’s campfires was a monstrous black wolf bigger than a snow bear, a creature made of shadow and night, with eyes that burned like coals. One of their warriors ran to attack it, and Bjorn watched as it grabbed him in its jaws and tore his arm off. It grabbed the screaming man again and shook its head back and forth until they all heard a violent _snap_ and the man went limp and silent. Dropping its kill, the wolf turned its head towards Bjorn and his brothers, and he felt a knot of dread fall into his stomach with the realization that the monster _recognized them._ It ignored the panicked warriors running about the camp and focused solely on Bjorn and his brothers, baring teeth the length of his hand and gathering itself to spring. 

“Back! _Back!_ ” Bjorn shouted, pushing his brothers away from the wolf and spotting Ivar hoisting himself up into his chariot. “Ivar! Make for the villa! It’s after us!”

“How do you know?!” Ivar called back as he grabbed the reins. 

“I just do, now _go!”_ Bjorn gave Ivar’s horse a sharp smack on the rump as he, Hvitserk, and Ubbe sprinted past, and soon enough Ivar was thundering past them away from the monster, hurtling through the deepening night. Bjorn heard the wolf howl behind him as they crossed the edge of their camp, and let his fear quicken his steps, hoping that the English-built walls that they had fought so hard to breach just a few days before might do something to hinder the wolf that was hunting them. 

Ivar was waiting in the courtyard in front of the hall when Bjorn and his brothers tore through the gate, a panicked look on his face. 

“Behind you! _Watch out!_ It’s after you!” 

“Inside! Get inside!” Bjorn ordered, grabbing at the bridle of Ivar’s horse and with his brothers’ help dragging the frightened beast and their youngest brother up the stairs and into the hall. They barely managed to get him in before the wolf was upon them. It thrust its snout between the double doors as Bjorn and Ubbe fought to close them, growling and snapping at Hvitserk’s arms as he tried to drop the bar into place. Finally, Hvitserk drew his sword and hacked at it, forcing it to retreat with a pained yelp and allowing him to finally bar the door. 

The brothers could hear the wolf growling and snarling outside the stone walls, but for now, they were safe. For a moment they just stood there, gasping for breath, until Hvitserk broke the silence. 

“What was that _thing?!”_

“It has to have been her. That Christian bitch,” Ivar said. “She’s the one who did this. Called the wolf.”

“You think she really cursed us?” Ubbe asked. 

“I think it’s only after us when it could be out there killing all of our warriors right now _Ubbe_.” Ivar snapped. 

Hvitserk held up his sword. In the weak moonlight through the windows the brothers could see a thick black liquid running down its blade. 

“I wounded it though.… Curse or not, monster or not, if something bleeds—“

“—you can kill it,” said Bjorn, echoing Hvitserk’s thought. 

“So what do we do? How do we get out of here? How do _I_ get out of here? ” said Ivar, gesturing around the hall. The corridors leading out to other rooms are much too narrow for his horse and chariot to pass through, outside the wolf still waited for them, and held never be able to escape if he had to crawl. 

“Maybe we don’t need to get ourselves out Ivar,” Ubbe said, looking up at the hall’s timbered roof with a smile on his face. “Maybe it’s all a matter of how that thing gets _in_.” 

—————————————————————————————————————————————

In their flight from the Great Army, the English hadn’t managed to strip everything of true value from Ecbert’s villa. The hall still held the long tables and benches that had seen so many feasts, there was still a good supply of food in one of the kitchens, a few weapons had been left behind in the armory, and Bjorn even found a supply of torches to bring light to their work. Ivar’s horse they managed to coax into a storeroom deep in the heart of the villa, and his chariot they’d forced down one of the wider hallways and into the baths. Working together, ignoring the wolf’s the increasingly frustrated growls and howls and bracing against its occasional attempts to break down the door, it took them just over an hour before they were finished. Swallowing down their fear yet again, they each took their places. 

“Ready?!” Bjorn called from his place near the door. 

“Ready!” Ubbe called from his place across the hall. He held a lit torch and had Ivar clinging tightly to his back. 

“Are you ready little brother?” Bjorn whispered to Hvitserk. The last hour’s work seemed like it had been putting Hvitserk’s mind at ease, but now that they were finished and it was time to put their plan into motion, his hands were beginning to shake. Following Bjorn’s gaze, Hvitserk clenched his hands several times, took a deep, shuddering breath and nodded. 

“Ready,” he murmured. 

“Good. Count of three?”

“Yes…. _Yes_.” 

“Alright. One, two, _three_.” 

On the count of three, Bjorn and Hvitserk pulled the bar from the door and yanked the doors to the hall open, darting around to hide between the great slabs of wood and the walls. At the same time, Ivar and Bjorn started screaming loud enough for the dead to hear from Valhalla. 

“Hey! Over here you ugly cunt!” Ubbe shouted, waving his torch over his head. 

“Yes, come and get us you English bitch!” Ivar yelled. 

The two of them saw the thing’s eyes first, twin fires peering at them from the pitch darkness outside the hall. Then the wolf roared, springing through the door, and tearing across the hall towards them. Ubbe turned, running as fast as he could with Ivar on his back towards a narrow servant’s corridor. As he darted across the threshold, he flung his torch at the floor behind him then kept running deeper into the heart of the villa.

Ubbe’s aim had been true. His torch landed in a pile of broken furniture and old books, and the oil-soaked kindling went up with a _whoosh_. The hungry flames licked across the threshold of the hallway and forced the wolf to stop in its tracks with an enraged howl. Snarling, it turned back to the doorway, to find Hvitserk and Bjorn in its way, Bjorn firing flaming arrows into the ceiling while Hvitserk worked to shove a pile of tables and other bits of broken furniture in front of the open doorway. The wolf charged them, long teeth glinting in the firelight, and Bjorn fell back, firing shot after shot up to the ceiling, each one a spark of hope that he and his brothers might actually live to see the dawn. He waited until the wolf was nearly at his throat before he broke and ran, shouting for Hvitserk to go ahead of him, clutching their last flaming arrow in his hand. Sliding around the pile of wood after his brother, Bjorn thrust the flaming arrow home, deep into the pile of shredded paper they’d heaped on top of an old table. The paper caught quickly, flames spreading to the oil soaked wood and covering his escape. 

The fires of the wolf’s red eyes only intensified as it was faced with this new barrier. Snarling and snapping in frustration and rage, it looked as though it might succeed in pushing it over and getting out to rip them to pieces. Bjorn drew his sword, squaring up next to Hvitserk, ready to die fighting if it came to that, but the wood was old and dry, and the flames quickly started to lick up the great oak doors themselves, and the rising heat forced the creature back.

The hall was well and truly burning now. The arrows fired into the ceiling had set the roof on fire, and flaming embers were raining down onto the wolf and the other piles of oil splashed wood they’d left scattered around the room. Hvitserk and Bjorn saw it scratching and biting at the sparks raining down on its back, before it turned in a panic and made for the hallways at the far end of the room. Howling in pain, it tried to squeeze its way to safety, but it was too big, and the flames were too hungry, and it could not get out. 

Heavy footsteps coming out of the darkness announced Ubbe’s arrival. He came out of the darkness with Ivar still in tow, and their faces showed wonder and relief in the light of the burning hall. The flames had gotten too intense to see through the doorway, but they could still hear the wolf’s agonized, enraged howling. The brothers stood together in silence, leaning on each other and gazing into the fire that had saved them, until the first section of the roof gave way and fell down into the hall, sending tongues of fire licking even higher up into the night sky and a wave of heat to drive them back. The howling had shifted now, the sound of the wolf still there, but running through it Bjorn thought he could hear the sound of a woman’s screaming - a high, wailing, agonizing keen filled with despair and rage and pain. 

Slowly, Ubbe let Ivar slide down to the ground, then sank down to sit beside him. Bjorn and Hvitserk followed suit, giving in to their exhaustion in this small way. Not one of them slept though. They sat together and watched the flames, until the hall was completed devoured, until the last tongue of fire had burned itself out, and the last echo of the wolf’s howl and the woman’s scream had faded away. By then, the first hints of dawn were beginning to warm the cold horizon. Without a word, Bjorn stood up and beckoned to his brothers. 

They left the ruined hall of King Ecbert of Wessex behind them and did not look back. 


End file.
